Page 69 of Fast Justice

Mal’s heart leapt, his attention riveted on his team leader.Thank you, God.

“Montoya shot at the witness, then took off in another vehicle and headed northeast, toward the port itself. Witness got a partial plate. FBI has confirmed the vehicle’s location via CCTV footage. They’re moving in on the port right now, with two of its SWAT teams. HRT is on standby, but because of Montoya, we’ve got precedence.”

Yes, Jesus, just let them get moving—

“Helo crew is readying two aircraft for us right now,” Taggart added, lowering his phone. “Let’s get moving. I’ll brief you with any updates on the way.”

Mal grabbed his gear and ran for the door, desperate to find Rowan in time to free her from Montoya’s clutches and a fate worse than death.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Rowan lay helpless on her back, hands pinned beneath her as she stared up at Montoya, pinned beneath his boot. Deep inside her the cold was beginning to thaw, the terrible, constant fear starting to melt beneath a rising tide of rage.

This piece of shit currently towering above her was a fucking coward, terrorizing her and all these women, keeping them bound and toying with them before he either killed them or sold them into a life of sexual slavery. All to get rich and make himself feel powerful.

Fuck. You.

She didn’t dare say it aloud, because she wasn’t stupid. But she let her eyes tell him exactly what she thought of him.

“What did Oceane and Anya tell you?” he pressed.

“About the attack in Mexico.” Her voice was rough, almost strangled.

His mouth tightened and he pressed down harder with his boot, compressing her ribcage. “About thebusiness.”

She searched her memory, her brain working slower under the bombardment of fear. “Some offshore bank accounts. Assets.”

“What else?” His voice was hard, implacable.

Jesus, she didn’t know. What did he want her to say? “My case is against Ruiz. Not them.”

“I don’t care about Ruiz,” he snarled. “I care about what Oceane and Anya told you.”

Rowan shook her head, heart thudding. “I only know what they told me, about the finances and the attack. I’m not privy to whatever else they told the federal agents. I don’t know anything else.” How could she convince him that she was telling the truth?

He stared down at her for a tense moment, his face eerily blank. Then he removed his foot and lunged over to grab one of the women by the hair.

The prisoner cried out, her legs flailing as he dragged her along the floor of the container. Rowan cringed and scrambled into a sitting position. Montoya jerked the poor woman to a halt a few feet away from Rowan and wrenched her head back, exposing the line of her throat. Rowan’s stomach contracted, fearing he was about to take out his switchblade and slash her throat.

“What’s your name,” he demanded of the girl in English, the beam of his flashlight illuminating her young face.

Frightened brown eyes settled on Rowan, the buried shame in them making her heart twist. “Gabriela,” she whispered, her naked body shaking.

“And if you could have one wish granted right now, Gabriela, what would it be?”

She bit her lower lip, her shoulders hunching as tears clogged her voice. “I want to go home to my family.”

Rowan’s throat tightened to the point of choking her. This girl was barely out of her teens and she’d been ripped away from her home, her family, then abused and terrorized for however long by this bastard and his men. Now he intended to sell her off as a sex slave. God, she wished she had a gun so she could shoot him right in his disgusting face.

“Tell you what, Gabriela,” Montoya went on in a silky voice, stroking the muzzle of the pistol over her hair. Gabriela shuddered, made a distressed sound. “If Miss Stewart tells me what I need to know, I’ll let you go.”

Both Gabriela and Rowan jerked their gazes up to him in shock. He was lying. But Gabriela was clearly now clinging to that desperate thread of hope because she turned heart wrenching, hopeful eyes on Rowan. “Please,” she begged. “Please tell him. I want to gohome.”

“Yes, Rowan,” he echoed, the gleam in his eyes making her ache to kill him. “Tell me.”

Helplessness flooded her. “I don’t know anything else,” she insisted.

“No?”

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